Women's Experiences of Paid Work and Planning for Retirement 

A note on methods used in this section

Women who indicated they were not retired at M4 were asked about factors that could be important in their decision-making about retirement. Factors considered to be not important and of limited importance were grouped together, and factors important and very important were grouped together.

All respondents to M4 were categorised into retired or not retired in order to look at differences in life events. The occupations of women who responded at M4 were categorised based on the outline provided in the classifications and definitions.

Factors motivating retirement

Figure 20 shows the ranking of the factors that women considered could be important in their decision-making about retirement. The two factors equally of most importance were women's own health and their financial security. These were followed by being able to access superannuation, but this was only slightly ahead of whether they wanted a lifestyle change. The need to provide care was also important for over 60% of women. Other factors that were of some importance were losing interest in their job, or that their job was becoming very stressful.

In lower order of importance for women's retirement decision-making was a partner's retirement, followed by being able to access various benefits, becoming eligible for the pension, and the number of people dependent on their income. Being retrenched from their job was ranked as the least important of all of these factors.

Figure 20: Factors motivating retirement

Clearly, many contingent factors are involved in women's retirement decisions, and it is questionable as to how many of these factors are within their control. However, as shown in research by others (eg Warren, 2006), the data suggest that partners make retirement decisions together, or at least that the retirement of a partner affects a woman's retirement decision-making.

Each ALSWH survey asked a number of questions about important events that have occurred in the women's lives. The table below shows 'yes' responses for selected events at M4, according to whether women were completely retired or not.

These data indicate that the retirement of a spouse or partner, whether recent or more long-standing, was significantly associated with women's retirement status. The same significance did not apply to a spouse or partner being made redundant, or to the death of spouse or partner. However, a partner's poor health was linked to retirement, as was the birth of a grandchild.

Table 8 shows associations between retirement status and a range of variables. It should be noted that these associations cannot be interpreted as having a causal or specific temporal link. This analysis does not include the date of the woman's retirement and therefore, for example, although a woman whose partner retired from work in the previous 12 months was more likely also to be retired, she could have left work at the same time, or 15 or 20 years earlier.

* Statistically significant (p = <.0001)

Although some women retired when their partner was made redundant, or when the partner died, as Figure 21 shows, others moved into work, presumably driven by the need to bring in replacement income. Note that these data are from the third survey in 2001.

Figure 21: Labour force participation for women whose partner has retired, M3 (N=387)

The following comment from a mid-age respondent illustrates some of the repercussions that a woman may face when her husband is made redundant.